Barbara Whitehead

Marriage of convenience with interesting depictions of early 19th century droving, farming, the battle of Trafalgar and British country life. A naval officer, grief-stricken at the recent death of an adored, beautiful but profligate wife, and horrified to learn of the debts she has left, as well as his responsibility for five young children, marries a competent, plain, thirty year old country lady to care for his children and estate in his absence. A story in the old HR style, with a largely absent hero and a heroine who learns she is less perfect than she once thought.

York Cycle of Mysteries #7 Part of the Dutch House has been converted into flats, inhabited by a diverse but fairly harmonious group of people, and despite Julia's misgivings more or less everyone rallies round at the opening. Even the follow-up from the local antique dealers seems fairly harmless. Then disaster strikes. One of the Dutch House community is found brutally murdered, and a selection of her most valuable antiques is missing. Detective Robert Southwell is assigned to the case. At first he thinks the murderer must be someone from outside but he changes his mind as he discovers that not all is as it seems in the apparently respectable lives of the flat-dwellers.